More time for Trident and JV partners ‘to realise the full oil and gas potential’ of block offshore Equatorial Guinea

Oil and gas company Trident Energy and the joint venture (JV) partners for Block G – located offshore Equatorial Guinea – have agreed to extend their Production Sharing Contract (PSC), effectively securing more time to explore, unlock and realise the block’s full potential.

Panoro Energy, one of the partners in the block, informed on Monday that the Ministry of Mines and Hydrocarbons of Equatorial Guinea and the JV partners for Block G had agreed to a material time extension of the PSC – covering both the producing Ceiba and Okume Complex fields in shallow and deep water in the Rio Muni basin – until 31 December 2040. 

Trident Energy is the operator of Block G with a 40.375 per cent working interest while Kosmos Energy holds a 40.375 per cent stake and GEPetrol the remaining 5.0 per cent interest.

John Hamilton, CEO of Panoro, commented: “Upon entering the Block G joint venture we had always identified an upside in extending the PSC expiry dates to realise the full potential in the Ceiba and Okume fields.”

Panoro confirmed that prior to the extension the PSC expiry date for the Ceiba field was in 2029 and for the Okume Complex field in 2034. Panoro expects that its net 2P reserves will increase by 2 to 3 million barrels as a result of this PSC extension.

“The extension substantially increases Panoro’s net 2P reserves in Block G and creates the time in which to unlock the material resources we believe to be present. We look forward to working with the Ministry and our Joint Venture partners to responsibly invest and further develop Block G to realise the full oil and gas potential of the block over the next 18 years,” added Hamilton.

The company’s full-year 2021 working interest – 14.25 per cent – production at Block G averaged 4,261 barrels of oil per day on a proforma basis, accounting for approximately 56 per cent of its total production in the year. 

According to Panoro, this extension will support the next phase of investment by the JV partners with further development drilling anticipated to start in the second half of 2023 to target material new production growth.

As part of Trident’s plan to further develop its assets in Equatorial Guinea, the company carried out its first drilling campaign in the country in 2021, which consisted of three wells – OG-01, OB-15, and OB-14 – and the drilling of the first of these three infill wells at the Okume Complex was completed back in August 2021. The drilling operations were done by the Vantage Drilling-owned Sapphire Driller jack-up rig.

Located in the Gulf of Guinea, the Ceiba field and Okume Complex assets comprise six oil fields. Situated on the slope of the southern Rio Muni Basin some 35 kilometres offshore, the Ceiba field was developed in phases with the production wells tied back to the Ceiba FPSO.

The Okume Complex consists of five separate oil fields – Okume, Ebano, Oveng, Akom North, and Elon – tied back to a central processing facility (CPF) at one of the Elon platforms. The processed oil from the CPF is transported via a 25-kilometre pipeline to the Ceiba FPSO for export.